‘We’re best friends,’ one woman tells me. ‘But he feels more like family than a lover. The idea of sex feels awkward.’
‘I adore my husband,’ says another. ‘He’s funny, kind, loyal, a brilliant father and still looks great. So why don’t I want to sleep with him anymore?’
These are some of the most common confessions I hear – and some of the most shame-laden.
People expect passion to fade over time. What they don’t expect is for it to completely run out with someone they still love deeply.
That’s when panic sets in. Is this the end? Is something wrong with me? Should I leave?
The truth? Loss of attraction in long-term relationships is both normal, explainable and often reversible. But only if you understand what’s really going on.
Here’s the first thing you need to know… You’re probably not with the wrong person.
You might well be. But if you think that solely because you aren’t having hot sex on a regular basis and you’ve been together a while, it’s safe to assume it’s got nothing to do with the person you’re with.
Tracey Cox says that we are not programmed for passionate long-term sex and gives her advice to those who feel as though the desire has faded
Too many good, solid couples have split because they no longer ‘lust’ after their partner.
Most enjoy a temporary lift with someone new – then find themselves straight back at the same place, usually wishing they’d stuck with their first choice.
No! This felt different, like it wasn’t going to happen this time. But it does. Again, and again.
The grim reality is we aren’t programmed for passionate long-term sex.
Lust and love are uneasy bedfellows, not best friends. Sex and love hormones battle in our brains, rather than happily sharing space. Losing desire for our partners is more ‘natural’ in long-term relationships than continuing to want sex.
Is it a straight couple’s problem? No. Gay men, gay women, bisexual, trans…this affects all of us, regardless of our sexual orientation.
So now you know the harsh truth, let me tell you some good news. There are ways to trick Mother Nature.
A DIFFERENT WAY OF LOOKING AT SEX
How to keep lust going is possibly the most important issue sex therapists, researchers and couples grapple with. I’ve effectively spent the last 30-odd years trying to find the answer.
There’s always fresh research, but the conclusion I have come to is this: there is no one solution. Just lots of little things you can do which, together, add up to a big change.
Things like understanding that…
Feeling like sex isn’t the only motivation to have it. Making your partner happy, feeling connected, to reap the many health benefits, giving pleasure – these are just a few good reasons to have sex. We need to move away from thinking desire is the only motivation.
Sex doesn’t have to be intense to be satisfying. OK sex is underrated – people place far too much emphasis on having to have frenzied, wild, all-consuming sex.
For most sexually satisfied couples, sex goes something like this. Out of every ten times you have sex, one or two are great, six are OK, one is ho-hum and the other is not good at all (If you’re not having bad sex, you’re not taking risks and trying new things). It’s unrealistic to expect to have mind-blowing sex all the time.
Spending time apart is healthy. Doing things separately gives you things to talk about, which is a tonic for your relationship. Grab back your individuality. Stop being matching bookends. Don’t let your partner choose everything for you – from what TV show to watch to what you’ll do in bed – and vice versa. Create differences.
Look as good as you can. The better you feel about your appearance, the more likely you are to want to get naked.
Stop being sex robots. We all have a tried-and-true path to orgasm that our partner knows. Great! If they use it every time, though, that well-trodden path feels about as exciting as your commute to work that you’ve done hundreds of times.
Tracey says couple should stop being ‘sex robots’ and start spicing up sex through fantasies (stock image)
Develop fantasies and stop worrying about what or who stars in them. Your partner can’t mind-read. Let your imagination run as wild as it wants to, with whoever it wants to. Yes, even that person. It works in your partner’s favour in the end. If that fantasy makes you enjoy sex more with them, your brain associates good sex with your partner, making you more open to doing it in the future.
Stop being so boring! We do everything with more gusto when we’re excited by life. Novelty in any area of your life has a knock-on effect, making us revitalised and more energetic. If you go through life on autopilot, life and sex are humdrum.
Add outside stimulation. Watch a sexy film or some erotica together, try some sex toys. Both are zero-effort, highly effective ways to inject desire into long-term relationships when you are tired of looking at the same scenery.
Don’t be complacent. What would happen if you didn’t do anything at all to maintain your home? The paint would peel, the grouting would fall out, that door would remain half-hanging off the hinge, and the carpets would get worn and threadbare. Most of us wouldn’t dream of letting this happen.
Why do we expect our sex lives to stay vibrant and perky without any improvements or refreshing?
You’ll find Tracey’s products at lovehoney.co.uk and info about her books, podcast and blog at traceycox.com.
THIS IS THE GAME CHANGER TO KEEPING DESIRE ALIVE
Not feeling like sex doesn’t mean you won’t enjoy sex once you start.
Stop and absorb that for a minute or two.
Understanding this is the penny-dropping moment that changes everything for many women.
There are two types of desire.
Spontaneous desire is when you feel like having sex out of the blue, without really needing a reason, and seek it out. Responsive desire is when you want sex only when something erotic is happening to you.
About two-thirds of men have a spontaneous desire style, but only 15 per cent of women do.
Thirty per cent of women experience responsive desire; the rest, about half of all women, experience some combination of the two.
When you first meet someone, lots of women get an artificial kick into the spontaneous sex camp. Novelty, newness and lots of hormones increase desire for sex for nearly everyone.
But if you’re naturally a responsive desire person, you quickly return to form after the honeymoon period wears off. There’s nothing wrong with you if that’s the way your body works: it’s the norm for a lot of women.
Here’s the magic trick.
Few couples like to be told to have sex when neither of them is in the mood – yet that’s exactly what you should be doing.
Starting sex ‘neutral’ or ‘cold’ – meaning neither of you is feeling turned on when you begin kissing or stroking – feels weird to start with. But once you realise desire builds as you both stimulate each other expertly, the more you relax into it. Before you know it, you’re both very much turned on and often orgasm.
The clue, in case you missed it, is the word ‘expertly’. This only works if you enjoy the sexual techniques your partner uses. If you don’t, show them what you do like.
THE 4 REASONS WHY WE LOSE DESIRE IN LONG-TERM RELATIONSHIPS
Ask someone under 25 if not wanting sex means you don’t love your partner and they’re likely to answer yes.
In fact, the opposite is true. Loving too much is what kills sex. No or low sex couples often describe themselves as soulmates. They see themselves as the same.
This, essentially, is the problem.
Love and desire are driven by different systems in the brain.
Romantic love is linked to oxytocin and attachment, and what we want from love – security, routine, to feel safe, wanted, protected – is the opposite of what fuels desire.
Sexual desire is driven by dopamine and novelty and thrives on less ‘pleasant’ feelings like risk, separation, uncertainty, anxiety and jealousy.
Love wants closeness, desire needs space.
Overfamiliarity and sex on repeat.
Studies show that novelty, not frequency, is key to desire. Following the same sexual script with the same person in the same bed eventually stops stimulating the brain completely.
Most couples are guilty of following the same sex formula. Every. Single. Time.
You’ve slipped into parent-child dynamics.
‘I feel like his mother – and mothers don’t fantasise about their sons,’ one married woman told me.
Harsh – but painfully common.
It’s called role erosion: when lovers stop seeing each other as individual adults and start relating as dependents.
Resentment is a powerful libido killer.
Research tells us women’s desire is particularly sensitive to emotional inequality – feeling taken for granted, shouldering the bulk of the work that’s necessary to keep a family or couple functioning, or carrying the relationship emotionally.
You might not consciously think, ‘I’m angry with him’, but our body often absorbs what our conscious mind doesn’t want to.
